- Dec 27, 2001
- 11,272
- 1
- 0
Initially I thought there was no way it would make sense. I'm the type to always get the free shipping and wait the extra week, satisfied that I got the best price even if I was inconvenienced.
But with gas almost costing $3 a gallon, I started wondering if the $3.99 overnight shipping and free two-day might start to make some financial sense. Unless you dedicate a large chunk of your time organizing and scheduling, which most of us don't for lots of reasons, you are going to need to run out for things on the spur of the moment. Maybe not if you're a single guy, but if you have a family you'll need diapers and gifts for innumerable occassions. I'm sure even a short run to Target, with stop and go traffic, would burn close to a gallon of gas which is $3. If it's the same price at Amazon, with prime, you're guaranteed to get it in two days.
Also, probably as a result of trying to stay profittable without raising prices, Amazon's service has blown lately. It takes a week or more often times to get a "free shipping" item to even leave the warehouse and then you've got a week until it gets there. I don't think two-day or overnight is necessarily a sign that you need to have it now, but, rather, that you know you can expect it to arrive as expected. If you want to buy a movie, you can and you know it'll be there in two days as opposed to ending up forgetting about it or wondering if you even ordered it.
So I may join and see if it ends up paying off. There still might be enough stuff you have to run out for that it doesn't end up saving you anything, but if I can cut out 3 trips a month that would probably save me $6 in gas.....across 12 months that almost pays for the membership. And you're not only saving gas money, but also time.
And it has no minimum order amount, so you can just get that one thing on sale without having to waste $10 on some filler you might or might not really want.
Just wondering what people think about it.
But with gas almost costing $3 a gallon, I started wondering if the $3.99 overnight shipping and free two-day might start to make some financial sense. Unless you dedicate a large chunk of your time organizing and scheduling, which most of us don't for lots of reasons, you are going to need to run out for things on the spur of the moment. Maybe not if you're a single guy, but if you have a family you'll need diapers and gifts for innumerable occassions. I'm sure even a short run to Target, with stop and go traffic, would burn close to a gallon of gas which is $3. If it's the same price at Amazon, with prime, you're guaranteed to get it in two days.
Also, probably as a result of trying to stay profittable without raising prices, Amazon's service has blown lately. It takes a week or more often times to get a "free shipping" item to even leave the warehouse and then you've got a week until it gets there. I don't think two-day or overnight is necessarily a sign that you need to have it now, but, rather, that you know you can expect it to arrive as expected. If you want to buy a movie, you can and you know it'll be there in two days as opposed to ending up forgetting about it or wondering if you even ordered it.
So I may join and see if it ends up paying off. There still might be enough stuff you have to run out for that it doesn't end up saving you anything, but if I can cut out 3 trips a month that would probably save me $6 in gas.....across 12 months that almost pays for the membership. And you're not only saving gas money, but also time.
And it has no minimum order amount, so you can just get that one thing on sale without having to waste $10 on some filler you might or might not really want.
Just wondering what people think about it.
Two were on clearance. Also, their dollar off coupon codes can make them the low cost leader on some things.
Facebook
Twitter